What They Found Read Free Page A

Mama Evans said.
    “That’s what she started running down,” Cheryl said. “But then I asked her what did she do when he started asking for some. She said they had an agreement that they would wait until they got married. She said that’s what Jesus would do under the circumstances.”
    “Nothing wrong with that, Cheryl,” Mama Evans said. “There was a time when people thought that waiting until you got married was what you were supposed to do. And many people still do.”
    “Those were the olden days, Mama Evans,” Cheryl said. “This is today. You don’t know what Jesus would be doing today. When you see a brother that pretty and he can get any girl he wants, and he’s saying he don’t want nothing even though he’s in love, you got to start thinking about what could be wrong. Am I right?”
    “I hope I don’t see where this is headed,” Mama Evans said. “You know you’re letting your scalp get too dry. You can’t just take care of the ends and keep your hair nice.”
    “A friend of mine puts green tea on her scalp. It’s got antioxidants or something like that,” Cheryl said.
    “So I had to ask Evelyn did she ever think that maybe the brother is on the down low? Sneaking around and seeing men and stuff like that? She said that she didn’t think it and she didn’t believe it, and I could see she was getting into a huff.”
    “I wonder why!”
    “I was wondering myself, Mama Evans,” Cheryl said. “I’m just thinking about her. I know she didn’t want to spend five years waiting for this dude and then see him running off with a man.”
    “Cheryl, people have their own lives and they have to deal with them as they can,” Mama Evans said. “That girl was raised in a Christian home and she’s trying to live what she’s been taught.”
    “I know she’s good people, Mama Evans, but how I know what he’s up to?” Cheryl said. “I told Evelyn she needed to rub up on him a little and see how excited he gets. Then she could back off at the last minute if she wanted to, but at least she would know how interested the brother was.”
    “Or she could just take his word for it, Cheryl,” Mama Evans said. “Relationships are built on trust.”
    “Uh-huh. But I heard about a guy who was married twenty-two years and had four children and then one day he woke up and realized he was a stone homosexual,”Cheryl said. “He kissed his wife goodbye, left ten dollars on the refrigerator, and ran off with his mailman’s cousin.”
    “Who must have woke up that morning and realized he was a homosexual, too,” Mama Evans said. “Cheryl, I don’t blame Evelyn for being upset with you. It’s one thing to bring up issues and it’s another thing trying to solve them when they’re not really your business.”
    “She wasn’t that mad with me, Mama Evans,” Cheryl said. “She didn’t get really mad until the next week.”
    “Sometimes it takes a while to think about a conversation,” Mama Evans said.
    “No, it was the troublemaker that got her mad,” Cheryl said. “And he was the one that didn’t know how to keep his mouth shut.”
    “Meaning?”
    “Meaning I was not going to let my homegirl get her feelings hurt if this guy was not going to show correct,” Cheryl said. “I knew I had to do something and do it quick!”
    “Oh, Lord.”
    “I knew that if Evelyn was afraid to check the brother out I had to do it.”
    “You had no choice?”
    “Right. So I thought that I would talk to him and just push up on him enough to check him out. So I got his number from Wayne who lives over that Egyptian storewhere they sell the loose cigarettes. I called Martin and told him I had to see him about something very important concerning Evelyn,” Cheryl said. “I told him I was worried about her so don’t say anything.”
    “Cheryl, please don’t tell me anything I don’t want to hear,” Mama Evans pleaded.
    “So he said he would meet me and I told him to come over to my apartment on